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Weakness
| rarity = Common | type = Unit Curse | combat_casting_cost = | research_cost = | effects = If the target fails a roll at , it receives the following penalties: * ; * . }} Weakness is a Common Unit Curse from to the Realm. For it may be cast on an enemy unit during combat. The target gets to make one Resistance roll as a unit to avert this curse, at a penalty of . If it fails, it immediately receives and . These penalties will continue to affect the unit until the end of the battle, or until Weakness is dispelled. Although the spell is also supposed to apply a penalty of , due to a bug, it does not do so in the official game. Effects Weakness can significantly reduce an enemy unit's attack strength - whether it's a Melee Attack, Ranged Attack, or both. This renders the unit less dangerous, and may make it completely incapable of attacking. Melee Attack Penalty While Weakness is affecting a unit, that unit's Melee Strength is reduced by . This decreases the unit's maximum "raw" output by points (per ) and, consequently, also reduces the average amount of that the unit will do with its Melee Attacks and Counter Attacks. Any unit reaching or less due to this effect will skip the Melee Damage phase of the Melee Sequence altogether, including any Touch Attacks that would be delivered along with this damage. Although it may still initiate attacks, the AI will no longer do so, even if the unit possesses Special Attacks that it may still be capable of using. Ranged Missile Attack Penalty While Weakness is affecting a unit, the unit's Attack Strength is also reduced by , provided that it has such an attack at all. Other types of Ranged Attacks are not affected. Again, this decreases the "raw" potential of this Attack Type by points (per ), thereby reducing the target's average output. Although a unit reaching or less as a result of this effect may still technically be capable of making Ranged Attacks (assuming it has any ammo left), it will inflict no , and may deliver no ranged Touch Attacks either. Immunities Units with Death- or Magic Immunity, and units under the Righteousness effect are completely immune to this spell; and so are Charmed Heroes. Furthermore, any unit with a total Resistance score of or more (after other modifiers) will never fail the roll and thus will not be affected either. The conditional Resistance bonus of the spell also applies against Weakness. Usage afflicted with Weakness.]] Weakness may only be cast during combat. It has a base Casting Cost of , and must always be targeted at an enemy unit that is not already under the effect of this curse. The target gets exactly one chance (as a unit) to the effect with a default modifier of , although if Weakness is cast by a Hero, this may be improved by Magical Items bearing a enchantment. The curse will last until the end of the battle, until it is dispelled, or until the target unit is destroyed; whichever occurs first. Acquisition As a Common Spell of the Realm, Weakness may become available to any Wizard who acquires at least Spellbook. With none, the spell can naturally not be learned during the campaign. This is the minimum requirement for it to be traded for, appear in Treasure, or be found in the spoils of victory when conquering the Fortress of a rival Wizard who already knows it. The base chance for Weakness to be researchable (at some point) in the campaign is roughly 30% (with book), which gradually increases with the amount of Spellbooks possessed or found during gameplay. With or more, the spell is certain to show up sooner or later, unless acquired from another source. It has a Research Cost of , although its research is quicker for Wizards possessing the Sage Master Retort, or a bookshelf containing or more. Weakness may also be selected as a starting spell by any Wizard with at least books. In this case, it will be available for casting as soon as the game begins. In addition, Weakness is available as a Hero spell. It is known by Ravashack the Necromancer, although it's worth noting that this feature is bugged in the latest official version of the game, and Weakness is one of the few affected spells. This means that Ravashack will likely not be able to actually access this spell unless the player installs one of the unofficial patches. Strategy Weakness can be used in either of two ways: it can neutralize a weak unit, or it can hinder a strong unit. Depending on the situation on the battlefield, choosing which unit to inflict with Weakness can be a tough call. However, reducing a very powerful unit's strength by such a small amount is often pointless, although it may still be a deciding factor in one-on-one combat between two such unit. Still, in most cases, there are usually better spells to cast in that scenario. On the other hand, normally suffer more from this spell, as the reduction will affect the attacks of each of their . Also, since most do not have a very high Attack Strength to begin with, Weakness can actually cut such a unit's effectiveness by half or even more. Finally, weaker units tend to have somewhat lower scores as well, making it more likely that they will fail their check against the spell. Known Bugs The in-game help text of the Weakness spell and the tooltip of the Weakness effect itself both indicate that the spell also reduces Attack Strength. However, due to a mismatched parameter check in the official game code, this does not actually happen, and are completely unaffected by Weakness. This is corrected in the latest release candidates of the Unofficial 1.51 Patch. In addition, this spell can bring the Melee Strength of certain units to zero, which will cause the AI to stop moving or attacking with the unit, regardless of other properties. This can negate the use of certain Special Attacks that are otherwise unaffected by the spell, but would only be executed on voluntary attacks, such as and . Units with Gaze Attacks are also affected, although in this case the situation is marginally better, as they can at least utilize these abilities on Counter Attacks. Unless, of course, the bug is exploited to simply gain more time to kill them off at range. The Unofficial Patch 1.50 corrects this behaviour. In fact, it also changes the rules slightly, so that "added effects", such as Touch Attacks, will trigger even from attacks that have a conventional Attack Strength of zero. Along with all other Unit Curses, Weakness is also a victim of another bug, namely that dispel-type effects skip the usual checks when attempting to remove it, and will thus always automatically succeed in doing so. This error is also fixed in the Unofficial Patch 1.50. Finally, the tooltip of the Weakness effect actually indicates that the spell does not allow a Resistance roll - a feature that was removed in the official patch 1.1. Unfortunately, not all entries in the in-game help have been updated to reflect this change, with the effect tooltip being one that has been left out.